Blacklist phone numbers

Hardware Librem 5
1

Is there any way to block phone numbers? Found nothing in GUI yet. Got spam call today (first time of last 15 years - would like to know where was the data hole) and want to block them. Also want to block every number that ends with different last 2 digits that they can’t call from similar numbers again.

If there is nothing yet, is there any plan to implement that?

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Didja recompile? I asked awhile back.

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No. As long as it is not important I don’t want to experiment and wait for something more official.

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Me?
No, I have not done anything with it.

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This would be infinitely more fun than just blocking numbers:

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GPT4 vs GPT4 - who will win the fight?

hint: the company who’s producing and selling electric energy. :wink:

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  • I would be a bit concerned that the AI that is working on your behalf may still accidentally leak information about you. So that would at the very least come down to: what information do you have to surrender to this company in order to engage their admittedly amusing service? (Online AIs have already been successfully tricked into overriding their core programming.)
  • Don’t try this in the EU. With the impending “ban” on AI in the EU, I would wonder whether the company will be bothered to jump through the expensive hoops needed to be compliant with EU law. At US$24 per customer per year, they would need plenty of customers in the EU to make it worth their while.

It could degenerate into a conversational cycle, much the way human arguments sometimes do. :slight_smile:

And the company who is selling the underlying hardware.

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But to come back to the point of this topic … I would consider this functionality to be medium priority. It is a demonstration of the power of a phone that is also a computer, where you can write new code and change existing code. I hope this comes along as standard functionality sooner rather than later.

Because the SIM that I put in my Librem 5 was relatively new for the purpose, I actually don’t get a lot of nuisance calls on my Librem 5 but your mileage will definitely vary. Basically nuisance calls have three sources:

  • the number was put out there by a previous user of that phone number
  • the number was put out there by you
  • the nuisance is just trying random phone numbers / all phone numbers (some kind of robocaller)

I do get a repeated caller who speaks Cantonese / Mandarin (don’t know which), which I would block if I could. :rofl:

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I used to get those before I changed all my numbers,due to having been compromised in multiple data breaches.

Might be explained by this: https://www.npr.org/2018/05/10/609117134/chinese-robocalls-bombarding-the-u-s-are-part-of-an-international-phone-scam

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Amarok’s GPT idea would be fun, but I wouldn’t expect it to get done before a regular blocker gets done.

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Someone who has the know-how simply needs to whip up something like this VOIP provider’s solutions: https://www.callcentric.com/features/call_treatments

Or, there’s always this simpler fallback: Estimate your Librem 5 shipping

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Pretty cool if it works. I’m thinking that a robocaller that is working its way sequentially through the mobile number space won’t update any database though.

I guess once the functionality exists to configure call handling based on the A party number, all of the following are options:

  • drop the call
  • play the modem sounds (make the scammer think that they reached a dial-up modem :rofl:)
  • play the IC SIT followed by the equivalent natural language message (but not in your own voice)

and many other creative choices e.g. divert to AI.

I would probably keep it simple and go with the first (drop the call).

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